Republic of Dreams

Based on the novel “The Cinnamon Shops” by Bruno Schulz

What fascinates us most are the fantastic, grotesque elements in his literature. The embellishments into dreamlike, incomprehensible states calls for the use of unusual theatrical devices. The loss of childhood in the cinnamon shops is a powerful theme in Schulz’s work. The father, who first transforms into a bird and then into various other things before shrinking and vanishing altogether, represents a metamorphosis that can only be portrayed with puppets. And the connected idea that there is someone behind everything is, of course, brilliant for puppet theater. The narrator’s desire to leave everything untouched, but having to endure the new world as such, is a subject that will always engage us. Schulz’s stories embody this reality in a manner that is atmospherically dense beyond imagination.